<Begin Segment 25>

MN: Now, since high school you worked as a part time draftsman and chainman on a field crew, and you eventually passed the state of California's land surveyors examination in 1960. Were you the first Japanese American to get a land surveyor's license in California?

RW: Actually there were two of us that year, the first two. He got his a little before me during the year. His license was issued before mine. I never did meet the guy, but I know his name was Yas Mikuriya, and I used to see his name around this area.

MN: What other states are you licensed in?

RW: Arizona and Nevada.

MN: You eventually opened up Robert Wada & Associates, and you've been in business for thirty-eight years. Have you ever been turned down for a project because you were Japanese American?

RW: I can't say yes or no to that because I'm not sure the reason, but I did a lot of proposals. When I would know that there was something amiss is they want to meet me on the job. "Why don't you come out? We're gonna show you what I need." You go out there and then when they take a second look at you, you know that they're kind of surprised that you're Japanese or Oriental. So yeah, I can't say that I was turned down, although I will say that I had a pretty hard time until I got a disability through the VA for my PTSD and for my back and my hearing from tanks. Then I got a disabled veteran rating from the state of California. Well, they have a requirement that contractors and builders, they have to give ten percent of their job to a DVBE, disabled veteran firm. That turned things around for me quite a bit, 'cause it became a mandatory, and there aren't too many disabled veteran firms, especially surveying.

MN: Your company has recorded hundreds of maps with the Los Angeles County with your name and company's name on it. How does that make you feel?

RW: Well, I don't know if I've recorded hundreds of maps, but I recorded quite a few. They're what they call Record of Surveys, Parcel Maps, Subdivision Maps. It just makes me feel that I've accomplished something because those maps are recorded with the County Recorder, and they're gonna be there forever, and people in the future, when they survey, the same area, they're gonna refer to those maps. And it's all done by Robert Wada & Associates. I work with maps sometimes way back in the 1800s. They're still on record and you can get copies of it. They were very Mickey Mouse surveys in those days, all done on paper, but it's totally different than today where they really control every monument, every marker that you set is got to be substantiated and why it's set there. It's a science in itself.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.